


Capes Not Included

by calliopes_pen



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Fluff and Humor, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-18
Updated: 2011-10-18
Packaged: 2018-12-04 06:40:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11549616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calliopes_pen/pseuds/calliopes_pen
Summary: During a bit of down time from the perils of alien invasions, Jack, the Doctor, and Rose decide whether or not to go to a planet where they could have temporary superpowers.





	Capes Not Included

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for Qldfloodauction, for Shengirl. The prompt was Superheroes, with a helping of OT3 friendship comedy for the Tenth Doctor, Jack, and Rose.

Some days you were in the mood for watching a warrior ricochet bullets off her bracelets, while saving hostages from a burning building. Some days you weren't. It was the luck of the draw as to whether you went anyway when the Doctor was involved. If such a film were shown in the distant future, off the beaten path in time and space, rule number one applied for everything from bathroom breaks to concession stand visits: Don't Wander Off.

Superheroes had been agreed upon as the genre of choice, given alien invasion movies like War of the Worlds would just bring up too many bad memories. That, and mockery, to the consternation of whoever was unfortunate enough to be in the audience beside them.

Leaving this futuristic cinema with its movies’ contents flashing the most exciting moments on a billboard—contents set to a wavelength that only those rushing towards the exits in a swirling sea of humanity could view, to keep spoilers at bay for the assorted patrons—each of three patrons tried to decide if it was really worth marathoning those previous installments. Or, in Jack Harkness’ undisputed and highly enthusiastic opinion, the trilogy of ever so faintly connected pornographic films of similar names, which packed in all the highlights for those that would rather watch something even more exciting.

The Doctor looked pointedly at Jack as he breathed in the regularly circulating and specially conditioned air. As though he were wondering what had warranted such a smile across his face, before shaking his head. He should not ask, he knew better at this point. Asking led to confusion, and horror, and musing with wonder how anyone could maintain positions being described. He shook his head, turning his thoughts to safer things. _Wonder Woman 9: This Time, It’s Warrior To Warrior_ could not be taken as something that would ever rival Shakespeare, but it was an interesting four hours nonetheless. Not something to rival an adventure, or get the blood pumping through your hearts. Four hours he couldn’t get back without creating a paradox and destroying all of time and space. Which…wasn’t worth doing due to a movie.

“I loved it,” Rose declared, breaking the silence. She was still working her way through a snack she’d picked up as they made their way out. It didn’t smell like normal popcorn, because of the chili pepper shreds. It was spicy, but tasty.

Rose frowned, then. “Mind you, the robotic severed head of Rocky Balboa coming out of the mists on a hoverboard was a surprise twist for me. He wasn’t in the comics, right? Not even in the 60’s? That was some kind of new thing.” The resounding “No!” from the directions of Jack and the Doctor revealed just how much of a fan they were respectively, and made her jump, spilling her popcorn. An automated janitor zipped by, then, sweeping the debris into a pan before taking its leave of them. The Time Lord and ex-Time Agent had been horrified for the duration of the proceedings, alternately staring in slack-jawed dismay, and quivering with the urge to shout what they had managed to get extremely wrong.

The Doctor’s face creased with a pained expression, before he finally muttered a strained, “Unless things have changed in the last century and a quarter, or since the last time I picked up an issue to peruse—by the way, remind me to tell you about my travels with Leela, she was more of an Amazon than those people on the screen will ever be—then I don’t believe the old Amazon Princess ever had green skin.”

“That was edible body paint,” Rose helpfully pointed out with a grin.

“Oh.” There was silence for a moment, only broken by the sound of Jack snickering. “Wonder Woman never wore a monocle or a garter belt on each leg, either. She wasn’t a beekeeper in her off hours.” He cast his mind back through his vast canyons of memories, through various lives, just to see whether he was mistaken in that regard. Nope. Not one bit. Memory like an elephant. Grudgingly, he added, “They _did_ get the white jumpsuit right, but I think people would just as soon forget it.” Like various things he himself wished to forget.

“The golden lasso wasn’t altered,” Jack interjected with a leering grin that put his previous one to shame. He desperate wanted to be tied up by it. Preferably by Rose and the Doctor, in as many kinky little escapades as they could come up with.

Another moment for them to let the movie’s gaping plotholes and general surreal qualities sink in, before any of the group broke the silence once more. The Doctor almost admired the screenwriter. Well, all ten of them and the assistant screenwriter. Too many cooks and all that. “Who would have guessed that Betty White’s disembodied, preserved brain could so wonderfully unravel the whole thing? Or make such a wonderful supervillain?”

Jack would never forget the telepathic humming of ‘Thank You For Being A Friend’ at high decibels. Frightening. If anyone drifted off, they would think they were having a nightmare.

The Doctor removed his glasses, carefully rubbing his eyes. Trying in vain to cause some of those scenes to fade from his memory. One of the perks of being a Time Lord was a memory that rarely failed. In this case, it was proving to be a disadvantage not to have the vague memory of a human. “The tenth movie is released in oh, let’s see…roughly three and a half months, two days, sixteen hours, and twelve seconds, thanks to the massive profit margin this provided. _Wonder Woman X: When Amazons Attack_. We can jump forward, get an eyeful of that, and then follow it up with the next twelve! _Or_ ,” he added with a twinkle of humor in his eyes, “we could go to see _Green Arrow XII: We’re Manly Men In Tights_ in the year 3015,” the Doctor said after a moment’s hesitation.

“Holograms surpass the 3D experience, so you get to watch Green Arrow pulling back on that quiver, getting all the notches as though he were standing right next to you, just waiting to wink in your general direction, Rose. Probably not yours, Jack,” the Doctor said with an air of apology. “They can only turn left. They didn’t make another mistake of fourth dimensional Smellovision after a rather unfortunate misstep involving the addition of a pigeon and a porn star earlier in this century, with, oh…the sixth one, wasn’t it?”

Rose rolled her eyes, knowing sometimes she just shouldn’t ask. “You dragged me to the premiere of _Supergirl 2_ , too, so you owe me. Next movie I want to see, you don’t make up excuses or aim for the wrong time to escape, or accidentally crash us all into another meteor. Got that? Or we see my Mum more often than we already do.” That should get him where it hurt the most. His unswerving phobia of slapping, and rage-filled mothers was rearing its head again.

The Doctor nodded and tapped his nose, silently contemplating the repercussions of that, before he burst into action. He had the perfect way to circumvent that! It would rouse their senses of curiosity, it would provide bonding experiences, and most importantly of all—it was brilliant! “What about I take you somewhere, that’ll make you both superheroes? I’ve been there six or eight times before, I’ve not yet had my fill of gliding through the clouds like a bird—but you two, you haven’t been. Not even you, Captain Jack Harkness. Not unless the Time Agency, they took you?” He'd brought old Joe and Jerry there with him, that first time...not that they'd needed any inspiration, of course, not those brilliant minds. Pulling his thoughts back from that tangent, his grin widened when he saw the ex-Time Agent shake his head in the negative.

Jack was listening. "I've heard of this one before. An adventure went wrong for you? Something was pumped in the air, right? Or is it the old red pill, blue pill?"

“So it’s like The Matrix,” Rose guessed. “Take the blue gas or the red gas? One wakes you up, other one takes you further down the rabbit hole.” Without actually putting someone under, like the pills a dentist would use to knock someone out. And without the unfortunate side effect of being the sort of gas that resulted in a person waking up in yet another prison or holding cell, after an adventure went wrong/

“Nearly. It took some tinkering on the molecular level at my last visit, and things were good as new. Oh, Captain, my Captain. Before, there was one power that would have made you fall to your knees in dismay and terror. Your little friend down there could just fall off before I fiddled with things.” He ignored Jack's wide eyes, as he hadn't meant that to sound the way it had. “That was it. _Poof_! Crumbled to ash, and never came back. How’s that a power, you wonder? Well, that hardy soul could reassemble it at will from molecules…he just couldn’t paste it back on. Tried that ten times, he did, before he agreed to go with me to the hospital. Dropped him off with the cat nuns of New New New York, several decades after I was there with Rose.” He could see Jack wouldn’t enjoy something that made his favorite appendage remove itself from the premises, so to speak.

“One version of that concoction they pumped into the atmosphere was recalled altogether. One fellow took a whiff of it, and it worked like a hair tonic instead of a power giver. Hair and beard and other bits grew 100 feet long, let me tell you. Drowning in a sea of hair, that was a strange sight even for me. Thousands of barbers hacking at it with giant shears. You could finally see his face again after three weeks of work, but it was a near thing.” He looked haunted ever so briefly, as though he could still see that man’s face hovering before him. He shook it off, the grin returning. “There was one…intriguing side effect for a lovely lady. I liked Banana Girl, even if she hated her extraordinary gift. I followed her around for a week, while she just threw bananas at me like I was a fly to be swatted. Good times! She could move a banana with her mind five feet forward or backward—not a single other fruit or vegetable, but she could hand me that banana like a dream…no fear getting low on potassium around her. She took over for Miss Chiquita Banana 75.”

He reached into his pocket as he remembered he had an extra bushel of bananas deep inside in a stasis field. Good snack, that was. He tossed an extra one Jack’s way with a wink.

“So you see, in its infamous beginnings it might not have worked correctly, with your primitive DNA. We would take a hop away from that, to when it was perfected. Make your own adventure.” He was challenging Jack to play the game, in spite of the now non-existent risks. The Captain would, thankfully, accept, if he knew him as well as he thought he did, he thought fondly.

When the two almost seemed wary, the Doctor looked to Rose. “Besides flight, the Captain or I could have super strength for a day. _Oh_ , Rose Tyler, we watched those wonderful carnosaurs soar above us on Bedlam Llama 29, remember? Twirling and looping with abandon!” He tugged his ear, thinking back. The abandon was only achieved thanks to a lack of real bones, their musculature primarily held up with flexible cartilage. “Well, now you can be the one soaring high up in the wild green yonder. Not always soaring, mind you. Not always green, either… Depends on what you’ve always dreamed of doing, what superpower you’d like to briefly have, with the possible exception of telepathy and mind control. Bad thing, that.” If mind control ran rampant on such a planet as that, people would take advantage and the lovely holiday season would become a place of nightmares. “X-Ray vision, although that’s more Jack. All temporary. Each and every power is, to keep visitors from taking over the place.”

At Jack’s laugh, he nodded. He’d heard rumors of the Master attempting it, before the Time War. So many powers, so little time, thanks to that madman bypassing their security features.

The Doctor quirked an eyebrow in Rose’s direction, before he suddenly rubbed his cheek in remembrance of Jackie’s fantastic right hook. “Can’t have you fluttering over the Powell Estates on your next trip home, now can we? Extra nanites in the fumes at the exit will see to that. If you or Jack takes to the clouds, capes are not included in the flight plan, not according to the brochure. Unfortunate, that.” His own capes were off limits, and as such would not be provided by him, either. He didn’t fancy a cape from his third life being covered in mud.

“Flight with capes over and around flagpoles will not go smoothly, and should not be attempted. It’s been added to the reading since my first visit,” he said darkly.

Jack looked at Rose, seeing from the interest in her eyes that she was thinking the same thing as him. First that you could practically see the hamster wheel spinning in all its insanity and glory inside the Doctor’s brain. The man wanted to pay this place another visit, and with his best friends was best. And second, that there was no way that either of them was going to turn down this offer. Rose nodded her agreement, waiting for Jack. Flying together, or getting into ridiculous amounts of trouble, the trio wanted to go all the way. It was an all or nothing kind of relationship, with an implicit trust that one wouldn’t let the other two live it down if things became embarrassing. Each wouldn’t allow the other to do something too perilous if the giddiness of it all became too much.

“Doc, if you’re in charge of this field trip, and we’re going to the time where it doesn’t turn into the smog that ate the universe, then I think we’re in good hands.” He paused, before adding, “So long as it doesn’t result in my being a man without a face.”

The other man paused, as though giving the joke some credence before he shook his head. “Type of power you get all hinges on a great big non-threatening button. Your choice for pressing. Square button, rectangle button, and hourglass shaped button, more buttons than you can count! Buttons on the walls. And count them, I did…until the middle management had me removed for five days once they’d had enough of me,” he recounted with a sigh. At Rose’s look, he blinked and looked down at his suit. “What? Banana under the collar?”

That mischievous smile of hers, tongue poking out for but a moment, showed she was ready to play with him. Trying her best to sound innocent, she said, “Nothing, it’s just that you sound like a carnival barker trying to make a pull to people already sold. Not half bad of an idea now that I think of it.”

Jack played along, stepping back to give the Doctor a good, long look. “You know, to really get the feel of a carnival barker down, you need a silly hat.” Something in the wardrobe room would do nicely when they weren’t off to parts unknown. Something likely to make the Doctor wriggle with remembered missteps of younger, bygone days.

The Doctor laughed delightedly at that. “In that case, down the line might just take us all to a carnival later. Step right this way into the good old TARDIS, then. Sit right back, relax, and we three go to the third best pleasure planet in this portion of the universe.” The Doctor had a bounce to his step as he did just that, throwing his coat over the nearest coral instead of the coat rack as they assumed their positions. Conveniently placed where the turbulence wouldn’t result in bowling one or the other over or onto the Doctor. His tone turned teasing, then, as he began hitting buttons and levers with wild abandon. One leg half over the console as though following a dance only he knew the steps to, he glanced over his shoulder. “A different sort of pleasure than you’re used to, right, Jack?”

With his tousled hair framing his face, and his glasses all askew, he looked the part of the mad scientist everyone knew he was at heart that much more. Jack thought it was sexy.

The hum of the TARDIS told him that the ancient girl was pleased her Time Lord was happy, and in all likelihood knew Jack’s intentions. One of the lights briefly flashed. She was giving her blessing to the proceedings, was his interpretation. She enjoyed the antics of her people, when they weren’t suffering.

For once, the Doctor’s driving was spot on, with only a mild shiver and shake to show their passing through the vortex. An easy journey was something to savor as best one could, before the Doctor’s eagerness to show off for his companions got the better of him. That was just the way everyone loved it.

It was home.

_Finis_

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to SeanDC and Miiro for beta reading.


End file.
